Saving wet books

Heritage Preservation (HP) has mounted four videos about simple book salvage techniques designed for a general audience. The videos run less than 30 seconds each and demonstrate how to rinse dirty books, dry damp books, dry wet books, and freeze books to gain time.

HP also offers five general tips: 1) prioritize to save what cannot be replaced first, 2) don’t delay as the goal is to prevent mold growth, 3) handle with care because wet materials are fragile, 4) work patiently because air drying is slow but sure, and 5) call in a pro for very valuable or fragile items.

The videos and simple tips are available at www.heritagepreservation.org/savewet-books/index.html.

Sustainable environments

The Image Permanence Institute (IPI) will present the two-day workshop “Sustainable Preservation Practices for Managing Storage Environments” five times between October 2010 and April 2011.

The workshop, supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities, is designed to help staff provide safe environments for the cultural objects in their care while reducing energy consumption and costs.

The first workshop will be held September 16–17, 2010, at the University of Texas-Austin; the second October 28–29, 2010, at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut; the third December 6–7, 2010, at the Minnesota Historical Society in St. Paul, Minnesota; the fourth February 10–11, 2011, at the Georgia Archives and Capitol Museum in Morrow, Georgia; and the fifth in March or April 2011 at the University of California-Los Angeles. Each workshop will be followed by a Webinar approximately three months later. Speakers include James Reilly of IPI and Peter Herzog of Herzog/Wheeler and Associates.

The workshop is free of charge, but participants must pay travel expenses. For more information, go to www.ipisustainability.org.

Storage strategies

The Conservation Center for Art & Historic Artifacts (CCAHA) is offering a two-day workshop, “A Space Odyssey: Storage Strategies of Cultural Collections,” October 12–13, 2010, in St. Paul, Minnesota.

The workshop will cover the essentials of collections storage in institutions of all sizes, including allocating resources and funds, space planning, environmental considerations, understanding HVAC systems, selecting off-site storage, retrofitting less than ideal spaces, visible storage, and moving collections.

The workshop costs $225 for CCAHA and Midwest Art Conservation Center members and $250 for nonmembers. The registration deadline is September 28. For more information and to register, go to www.ccaha.org/education/program-calendar.

Preserving digital television

The National Digital Information and Infrastructure Preservation Program (NDIIPP) at the Library of Congress has mounted the final report of Preserving Digital Public Television (PDPTV). The seven-year program made significant progress in understanding technical and organizational issues and reaching out to the PTV community. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting has created the American Archive, which will work to provide long-term preservation of and access to U.S. public radio and television programming.

For a copy of the final PDPTV report and for more information, go to www.thirteen.org/ptvdigitalarchive/.